AMERICAN BURN ASSOCIATION

The American Burn Association (ABA) appreciates the opportunity to comment on the Medicare Program Proposed Changes to the Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment Systems and Fiscal Year 2009 Rates. The American Burn Association represents the nation’s burn surgeons, nurses, therapists, and other members of the burn team, and the nation’s leading medical institutions with burn centers which provide therapeutic and surgical services for burn patients and other patients diagnosed with extensive and/or life-threatening skin diseases. Burn centers in the US are a critical national resource, particularly in regards to disaster preparedness – whether from potential terrorist acts or natural calamities – to the extent that the proposed regulatory changes jeopardize reimbursement for hospital burn centers; this would weaken the national preparedness capacity for mass burn casualty situations.